A UK startup wants to turn digital video cameras into health monitors for use in prisons, hospitals, and assisted-living homes.

One of five finalists at TechCrunch Disrupt London, Oxehealth (pronounced Oxy-health) is competing this week for $50,000.

On stage at London's Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, CEO Hugh Lloyd-Jukes described the company's software, which monitors human activity and vital signs with "medical-grade accuracy"—even from across the room. This is achieved through a combination of computer vision, machine learning, and the ability to track subtle skin color changes to accurately track a heartbeat as well as breathing over time.

With an eye toward police and care homes, the firm's presentation focused mainly on healthcare opportunities, suggesting that some "forward-looking" hospitals are installing cameras in their wards to remotely monitor patients.

But Oxehealth takes things a step further, providing alerts and vital signs, as well as a livestream video.

"That enables doctors to do radically different things" with cameras, Lloyd-Jukes said, tipping real-time status changes like "patient in bed" or "patient out of bed."

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Boasting software "as accurate as a contact medical device," Oxehealth's supplementary program eliminates the need for wired monitors. It does not, however, replace physicians' mandated patient checks; instead, it alerts doctors and nurses to the possibility for additional reviews based on slight changes and movement.

The company has already inked its first two commercial deals for video analytics, with 15 police forces and eight mental health trusts in its pipeline. Oxecam medical analytics, meanwhile, is adding to its first two complete clinical studies with a third wrapping up now.

"No one else can monitor human vital signs in rooms in the way we can through a camera," Lloyd-Jukes said this week. "There've been plenty of attempts, but we've cracked the problems of the environment that made that difficult in the past."

About the Author

Stephanie joined PCMag in May 2012, moving to New York City from Frederick, Md., where she worked for four years as a multimedia reporter at the second-largest daily newspaper in Maryland. She interned at Baltimore magazine and graduated from Indiana University of Pennsylvania (in the town of Indiana, in the state of Pennsylvania) with a degree in ... See Full Bio

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